Trump meets with Macron in first international trip since reelection: ‘World is going a little crazy right now’
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(PARIS) — President-elect Donald Trump kicked off his first foreign trip since his reelection with a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace.
Ahead of the meeting, Macron welcomed Trump, saying, “It’s a great honor for the French people to welcome you five years later.”
Macron thanked Trump for his “solidarity” and “immediate action” during his first presidency: “You were at the time the president, the first time, and I remember the solidarity and your immediate action. Welcome back again. Thank you. We are very happy to have you here.”
Trump in return celebrated the “great success” the United States and France had together on “defense and offense” during his first term and said they will talk about how the world is “going a little crazy right now.”
“Thank you very much. Very great honor. And we had a great relationship. As everyone knows, we accomplished a lot together,” he said. “And the people of France are spectacular. I guess it’s one of our largest groups in the United States, French people, and we respect them and we love them. Very talented people, extremely energetic people, as you know very well, yeah, and it’s an honor to be here.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy joined Macron and Trump at about 11:34 a.m. Eastern time. However, he did not offer remarks ahead of the meeting.
Trump is in France to partake in the reopening ceremonies for Notre Dame more than five years after a fire severely damaged the cathedral. First lady Jill Biden is also among the representatives from around the world attending the ceremonies.
The meeting comes at a time when Macron’s government is undergoing a political crisis after his prime minister, Michel Barnier, resigned after facing a no-confidence vote. Macron, who became president in 2017, has vowed he will serve until the end of his term in 2027 despite facing calls from some to resign.
“We had a good time together, and we had a lot of lot of success, really great success, working together on defense and offense too,” Trump said of the U.S.-French relationship in his first administration. “And it certainly seems like the world is going a little crazy right now, and we’ll be talking about that.”
Trump arrived at the Elysee Palace around 10:41 a.m. and met with Macron outside before walking into the building around 10:43 a.m. Eastern time. He was also set to meet with Prince William, the Prince of Wales, for the first time since 2019, but their meeting before the Notre Dame ceremony was canceled.
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) — For a second day this week, Vice President Kamala Harris is focusing on a key voting bloc that is a critical base for the Democratic Party: Black men.
On Tuesday, Harris will participate in an audio town hall event with Charlemagne tha God, host for the popular “The Breakfast Club” podcast. Also on Tuesday, the vice president is meeting with Black entrepreneurs in Detroit.
Her events come a day after her campaign rolled out a comprehensive plan — just three weeks until the election — to help Black men “get ahead” economically, which includes providing one million fully forgivable loans to Black entrepreneurs and an effort to invest in Black male teachers.
In an interview on “Roland Martin Unfiltered,” also released on Monday, Harris argued that economic policies that consider “historical barriers” facing Black people benefit all Americans.
“If you have public policy, and I’m talking about economic public policy specifically at this point, but if you have public policy that recognizes historical barriers and what we need to do then to overcome,” Harris said. “First, speak truth about them and then overcome them, that in the process of doing that, not only are you directly dealing with the injustices and the legal and procedural barriers that have been focused on Black folks, but by eliminating those barriers, everyone actually benefits, right?”
The focus on Black voters comes after former President Barack Obama sternly chided Black men over “excuses” to not vote for Harris while speaking to a group of Black at a campaign field office in Pittsburgh’s East Liberty neighborhood last week.
“You have [Trump], who has consistently shown disregard, not just for the communities, but for you as a person, and you’re thinking about sitting out?” Obama asked. “And you’re coming up with all kinds of reasons and excuses?”
Harris is polling ahead of Trump with Black voters who are registered to vote, 82-13%, according to the latest ABC News/Ipsos poll. That compares with 87-12% in the 2020 exit poll (a slight 5 points lower for Harris; no better for Trump). Black men are at 76-18% (compared with 79-19% four years ago), the poll found.
These differences from 2020 aren’t statistically significant, and Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock said he agrees.
“I don’t buy this idea that there will be huge swaths of Black men voting for Donald Trump. That’s not going to happen. What I would urge folks to do is to show up, to understand that if you don’t vote, that is a vote for Donald Trump. That’s the concern.,” said Warnock on a Tuesday campaign call with reporters.
Part of the Harris campaign’s plan for Black men includes legalizing recreational marijuana nationwide. Such a move would “break down unjust legal barriers that hold Black men and other Americans back,” the campaign said in its release.
This takes the Biden administration’s current stance, which includes pardoning people convicted of marijuana possession, a step further. For Harris’ part, such a proposal is evidence of her evolving position. She has become more progressive since her time as attorney general of California when she was heavily criticized for aggressively prosecuting weed-related crimes.
Asked if she ever smoked by Charlamagne tha God back in 2019, Harris responded, “I have. And I inhaled — I did inhale. It was a long time ago. But, yes.”
She went on to clarify that she believes in legalizing the substance.
“I have had concerns, the full record, I have had concerns, which I think — first of all, let me just make this statement very clear, I believe we need to legalize marijuana,” she said. “Now, that being said — and this is not a ‘but,’ it is an ‘and’ — and we need to research, which is one of the reasons we need to legalize it. We need to move it on the schedule so that we can research the impact of weed on a developing brain. You know, that part of the brain that develops judgment, actually begins its growth at age 18 through age 24.”
Her answer garnered backlash due to her record prosecuting the substance, particularly given the racial disparities in punishment nationwide. Harris’ new proposal looks to correct those historical inequities.
But is it enough?
In addition to the new proposals, Harris has aggressively been campaigning in Black communities in the past week, stopping at several local Black-owned businesses and churches in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Michigan as well as appearing on several media programs with predominately Black audiences.
In September, Harris told a group of Black reporters in a moderated conversation hosted by the National Association of Black Journalists that she was “working to earn the vote, not assuming I’m going to have it because I am Black.”
Her campaign launched a “Black Men Huddle” organizing call on Monday, which featured remarks from campaign senior officials Tony West, Brian Nelson, Quentin Fulks and Rep. Cedric Richmond. Later, there was a weekly event focused on Black men supporting Harris featuring actor Don Cheadle.
“What the vice president is doing is giving us the tools to be able to go and have meaningful, impactful conversations when Black men turn back around to us and say, ‘Well, what’s in it for me,’ I think that we have policy and tools like this that we can say exactly that,” said Fulks.
Doc Rivers, who interviewed Harris for his “ALL the SMOKE” podcast on Monday, said he agreed with Obama’s comments last week and pushed for Black men to cast their ballots.
“I agree 100% with President Obama — it’s unacceptable not to vote. When you look back at what your parents and your grandparents had to do to get the right to vote, that’s unacceptable for me,” said Rivers. “But there are Black men who out there that feel hopeless, they don’t believe a vote helps them in either way, and I’m here to tell them they’re wrong.”
ABC News interviewed Black men in Pittsburgh’s predominately Black Homewood Brushton neighborhood last Friday about their impressions of Harris and what she needed to do to get their vote.
Aquail Bey, a student at The Community College of Allegheny County and president of its veterans club, said Harris needs to meet them where they are and genuinely speak with them.
“She’s doing a good job right now, but I think she should have — go to places where they are, you know, meet them on their own terms, you know. Go to the neighborhoods where they are, go to the barber shops … ” Bey said. “Wherever the Black men are, go to where they are, speak to them a way that they understand.”
Aaron Stuckey said people shouldn’t assume Black men aren’t getting behind Harris.
“Just poll us instead of assuming that that’s where we’re not going,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced the Pentagon will send nearly $1 billion to Ukraine, bringing the total the United States has committed to Ukraine to more than $62 billion since Russia launched its invasion in February 2022.
The package dedicated an additional $988 million to Ukraine and will provide the country with more drones, rockets for the High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, and support for maintenance and sustainment.
Since the package was made through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, the assistance will be for contracts to deliver these systems to Ukraine after they are manufactured. This is different from the program the U.S. routinely gives Ukraine assistance through in which existing weapons from U.S. military stockpiles are provided to Ukraine quickly and the dollar amounts replenish U.S. supplies with new weapons.
“Together, we have helped Ukraine survive an all-out assault by the largest military in Europe,” said Austin, who noted he has convened the Ukraine Defense Contract Group of allies to Ukraine 24 times to coordinate aid. “Meanwhile, Russia has paid a staggering price.”
Austin said that since Russia launched its offensive, it has suffered at least 700,000 casualties and lost more than $200 billion.
This aid package is part of the effort to try to get Ukraine as much military aid as possible before the Trump administration takes over on Jan. 20 and is the 22nd aid package the Biden administration has sent to Ukraine under the USAI. It is likely the Biden administration is not going to be able to use up the almost $8 billion in Ukraine military aid funding still available that it had hoped to give Ukraine before the start of the Trump administration, according to a U.S. official. That opens up the possibility that it will be up to the Trump administration to decide what to do with the remaining congressionally approved funds.
Austin was delivering the keynote address at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute in Simi Valley, California, on Saturday as he and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell each accepted the Reagan Peace Through Strength Award.
“There is no such thing as a safe retreat from today’s interwoven world,” he said. “We are seeing a sneak preview of a world built by tyrants and thugs, a chaotic world, violent world, far into spheres of influence.”
“This administration has made its choice, and so has a bipartisan coalition in Congress,” Austin added. “The next administration must make its own choice. From this library, from this podium, I am confident that President Reagan would have stood on the side of Ukraine, American security, and human freedom.”
His remarks followed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meeting with President-elect Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris earlier Saturday ahead of the reopening ceremony for the Notre Dame Cathedral. Foreign leaders have been attempting to pressure Trump to continue sending aid to Ukraine once he takes office.
Trump has reportedly been in communication with the Russian President Vladimir Putin multiple times since leaving office in 2021 and has vowed he will end the war in Ukraine in “24 hours.”
“The baton will soon be passed,” Austin concluded. “Others will decide the course ahead. And I hope they will build on the strength that we have forged over the past four years.”
The remarks come as Trump’s pick to lead the DOD, Pete Hegseth, has faced increased scrutiny amid allegations of sexual misconduct and claims he has been drunk in public.
Trump has stood by his choice of Hegseth, saying in a preview of his interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that “Pete is doing well now. I mean, people were a little bit concerned. He’s a young guy with a tremendous track record. … He loves the military, and I think people are starting to see it. So we’ll be working on his nomination, along with a lot of others.”
(WILMINGTON, N.C.) — Former President Donald Trump is returning to the key battleground state of North Carolina on Saturday amid a major controversy revolving around North Carolina’s Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson, who the former president had previously supported and called “Martin Luther King on steroids.”
Robinson, the sitting Republican lieutenant governor of North Carolina, allegedly posted inflammatory comments on a message board of a pornography website more than a decade ago, according to a report out Thursday from CNN.
Robinson is not expected to attend Saturday’s rally, though sources caution plans could always change. Trump has not given any indication that he intends to pull his endorsement of Robinson.
The controversy has become a new headache for Trump in the final stretch of the 2024 election cycle.
Trump has campaigned for Robinson multiple times this election cycle, including inviting him to speak at his rallies in North Carolina this year and hosting him at his Mar-a-Lago estate for a fundraiser last year. Also, Trump’s advisers are keenly aware just how important battleground North Carolina is for the former president’s victory in November.
People close to the former president told ABC News that they were bracing for the Robinson story on Thursday. Sources said the campaign was planning to put more distance between Trump and Robinson, but initially did not have plans to call on him to drop out.
“President Trump’s campaign is focused on winning the White House and saving this country. North Carolina is a vital part of that plan,” Trump campaign’s National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote in a statement to ABC News in response to allegations about Robinson.
When it comes to winning North Carolina, the Trump campaign “will not take our eye off the ball,” Leavitt said.
Trump has yet to make any direct comment on the Robinson controversy. His running mate Sen. JD Vance dodged reporters’ questions about it on Thursday, later, in a post on X, he repeated attacks on Harris as his “comment on Mark Robinson.”
Among the controversial comments Robinson allegedly made online many years ago, according to CNN’s reporting, is one comment where he allegedly referred to himself as a “black NAZI!” CNN reports the comments were made by Robinson between 2008-2012 under the username “minisoldr” on “Nude Africa,” a pornographic website that includes a message board.
ABC News has not confirmed this reporting or the online username alleged to be linked to him.
Robinson has denied he made the comments and claimed the allegations were “salacious tabloid lies.” Defending his character, Robinson vowed to stay in the race as the deadline to drop out as a candidate in North Carolina approached on Thursday.
While Robinson’s alleged past comments online have received a lot of attention, so too have Trump’s past comments in support of Robinson.
“This is Martin Luther King on steroids,” Trump said at a rally in March 2024 while campaigning in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Taking the stage after Robinson’s speech, Trump said, “I told that to Mark. I said, ‘I think you’re better than Martin Luther King. I think you are Martin Luther King times two.'”
Trump later said he was “outstanding” and set to “be the next governor” of North Carolina.
In December 2023, at a private Mar-a-Lago fundraiser supporting Robinson, Trump said people should “cherish” Robinson like a “fine wine.”
“We have to cherish Mark. We have to cherish him. It’s like a fine wine, because that’s what you have, you have a fine wine,” Trump said in a social media video posted by North Carolina politician Robert Ward, who attended the fundraiser.
Trump further called Robinson an “outstanding person” that he “got to know fairly quickly,” asking donors gathered at his property to donate to Robinson and to get out and vote because he has a “tough opponent.”
“You got to help him financially, because you all people that have a lot of money — I know, rich as hell. So anything you were going to do, quadruple it,” Trump said.
Trump campaigned with Robinson twice at his North Carolina rallies in August. In Asheville, on Aug. 14, Robinson was the final speaker of the pre-programming prior to Trump’s arrival, and Trump called him a “good man” and a “fighter” in a relatively short shout out.
“I want to thank a very good man, and he’s in there fighting,” Trump said about Robinson. “… We know he’s a fighter. The next governor of North Carolina, Mark Robinson. Thanks, Mark. This is Mrs. Robinson. Thank you. They’re a great, great couple. Thank you both.”
In Asheboro, on Aug. 21, Robinson did not speak on stage, but Trump gave him a shout out during his speech and briefly brought him on stage.
The Harris campaign has been capitalizing on Trump and Robinson’s relationship on social media, firing off a series of posts featuring Trump’s praising past comments on Robinson and calling them “best friends.”
On Friday, the Harris campaign released a new ad that seeks to tie Trump to Robinson, saying “they’re both wrong for North Carolina.”
The ad, which will air in North Carolina, features past clips of Trump praising Robinson. The 30-second spot also highlights Robinson’s hard-line comments on abortion.
The ad does not include the alleged comments and conduct outlined in CNN’s article.
ABC News’ Fritz Farrow, Gabriella Abdul-Hakim and Will McDuffie contributed to this report.
